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RE: Capitalism - the Ultimate Religion
October 2, 2010 at 3:28 am
(This post was last modified: October 9, 2010 at 5:13 am by TheDarkestOfAngels.)
The problem with pure capitalism is that it can result in an oligarchy.
The problem with pure communism is that it can result in totalitarianism.
The best society is going to be designed as a balancing act between the two to prevent either from happening.
If today you can take a thing like evolution and make it a crime to teach in the public schools, tomorrow you can make it a crime to teach it in the private schools and next year you can make it a crime to teach it to the hustings or in the church. At the next session you may ban books and the newspapers...
Ignorance and fanaticism are ever busy and need feeding. Always feeding and gloating for more. Today it is the public school teachers; tomorrow the private. The next day the preachers and the lecturers, the magazines, the books, the newspapers. After a while, Your Honor, it is the setting of man against man and creed against creed until with flying banners and beating drums we are marching backward to the glorious ages of the sixteenth centry when bigots lighted fagots to burn the men who dared to bring any intelligence and enlightenment and culture to the human mind. ~Clarence Darrow, at the Scopes Monkey Trial, 1925
Politics is supposed to be the second-oldest profession. I have come to realize that it bears a very close resemblance to the first. ~Ronald Reagan
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RE: Capitalism - the Ultimate Religion
October 2, 2010 at 6:30 am
(This post was last modified: October 2, 2010 at 6:39 am by Existentialist.)
(October 2, 2010 at 3:28 am)TheDarkestOfAngels Wrote: The problem with pure capitalism is that it can result in an autocracy.
The problem with pure communism is that it can result in totalitarianism.
The best society is going to be designed as a balancing act between the two to prevent either from happening.
This is a false polarity. Communism and Capitalism aren't on a sliding scale, with one at one end and the other at the other in their "pure" form. Capitalism is flexible - it bends and adjusts to pressure to neutralise revolutionary forces before they destroy it, so capitalism in its "pure" form includes massive concessions. We have never had a communist society so we cannot know whether communism leads to totalitarianism or not; communism would need to be a worldwide phenomenon, not one set up in a minority of countries acting as nation states, for us to judge. I'm not saying I would advocate that, but I do feel the need to accurately assess my role and position in the religion of capitalism, as we all should.
(October 2, 2010 at 3:23 am)Zen Badger Wrote: To paraphrase Churchill,
Capitalism is the worst system of all, apart from all the others.
There's a lot of repair work to do in Bladon this morning, I hear one of the graves appears to have been disturbed in the night - from the inside!
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RE: Capitalism - the Ultimate Religion
October 2, 2010 at 6:59 am
ALL ideologies are flawed and temporary,the Utopian ones are the most seriously flawed.
I don't mind the Australian version of controlled democracy, as I'm very comfy thank you. Would not live in America unless I was rich enough not to have to pay tax. 
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RE: Capitalism - the Ultimate Religion
October 2, 2010 at 7:17 am
(October 2, 2010 at 6:59 am)padraic Wrote: ALL ideologies are flawed and temporary,the Utopian ones are the most seriously flawed.
I don't mind the Australian version of controlled democracy, as I'm very comfy thank you. Would not live in America unless I was rich enough not to have to pay tax.
The Australian version of controlled democracy is an ideology.
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RE: Capitalism - the Ultimate Religion
October 2, 2010 at 7:54 am
(October 2, 2010 at 3:28 am)TheDarkestOfAngels Wrote: The problem with pure capitalism is that it can result in an autocracy.
The problem with pure communism is that it can result in totalitarianism.
The best society is going to be designed as a balancing act between the two to prevent either from happening.
I like to call that Social Democracy  Imagine: Everyone having an equal opportunity to succeed, and then when you succeed you can help out the other guys who are still trying. In capitalism this "helping" does not occur in most cases from what I have seen.
Capitalism is a great system. The reason why it doesn't work? People just suck.
So why socialism? The elected government can deal with those people that suck and force them to help out in some way. i.e. The rich pay more taxes because they can.
Quote:"An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity. "
Martin Luther King, Jr.
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RE: Capitalism - the Ultimate Religion
October 2, 2010 at 8:32 am
(October 2, 2010 at 7:54 am)HeyItsZeus Wrote: I like to call that Social Democracy Social Democracy is one version of capitalism - one doctrine for perpetuating oppression by the universal religion, capitalism.
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RE: Capitalism - the Ultimate Religion
October 2, 2010 at 8:47 am
So what do you propose instead existentialist?
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RE: Capitalism - the Ultimate Religion
October 2, 2010 at 8:48 am
(October 2, 2010 at 3:28 am)TheDarkestOfAngels Wrote: The problem with pure capitalism is that it can result in an autocracy.
The problem with pure communism is that it can result in totalitarianism.
Just a slight note. Socialism doesn't nesserily mean = Communism.
There's such a thing as social democracy.
Personaly I don't give a rats arse about politics. Don't really care what a country does or how badly it screws up.
I'm not with capitalism and not entirely with socialism either. I'm with some socalist ideals.
If it means better social equality, rights and freedom then I'm all for it. Socalism or not.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence - Carl Sagan
Mankind's intelligence walks hand in hand with it's stupidity.
Being an atheist says nothing about your overall intelligence, it just means you don't believe in god. Atheists can be as bright as any scientist and as stupid as any creationist.
You never really know just how stupid someone is, until you've argued with them.
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RE: Capitalism - the Ultimate Religion
October 2, 2010 at 8:54 am
No system is perfect.
No system CAN be perfect.
Because once you put people in the equation it'll be immediately fucked.
![[Image: mybannerglitter06eee094.gif]](https://images.weserv.nl/?url=i118.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fo112%2Fpussinboots_photos%2FBikes%2Fmybannerglitter06eee094.gif)
If you're not supposed to ride faster than your guardian angel can fly then mine had better get a bloody SR-71.
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RE: Capitalism - the Ultimate Religion
October 2, 2010 at 9:40 am
(October 2, 2010 at 8:54 am)Zen Badger Wrote: No system is perfect.
No system CAN be perfect.
Because once you put people in the equation it'll be immediately fucked. I agree totally. There is no perfect system. It is still legitimate to talk about capitalism, its limitations, its anti-democratic fundamentals, and its profoundly religious nature. To talk about religion - in particular, the residual religions that are on the wane like christianity, judaism and islam, without talking about capitalism is to confine atheist discussion to a backwater.
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